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How Trump plans to cement control of government by dismantling the 'deep state'

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By James Oliphant and Steve Holland
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump arrives at Washington Dulles International Airport in Dulles
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, his wife Melania and son Barron arrive at Washington Dulles International Airport in Dulles, Virginia, U.S., January 18, 2025. REUTERS/Carlos Barria Image: Reuters/Carlos Barria

President-elect Donald Trump is poised to seize greater control of the federal government than any modern president before him when he takes office on Monday, charging ahead with plans to dismantle what he and his allies call the "deep state," according to two sources familiar with transition discussions.

The effort could get underway as early as Trump's first day as president, according to one of the sources, with an executive order aimed at stripping job protections from an estimated 50,000 career federal employees, allowing their replacement by handpicked loyalist appointees.

The Trump administration will also push to fill the thousands of political appointments across government as soon as possible, another source told Reuters.

The goal is to inject political loyalists deep into the workings of government, perhaps more so that any other recent president.

In a harbinger of what may lie ahead, Trump's team has requested the resignation of three senior career diplomats who oversee the U.S. State Department's workforce and internal coordination, Reuters reported this week.

Trump allies blame bureaucrats they deem disloyal for thwarting his agenda during his first term in the White House by slow-walking initiatives in the Justice Department, the Department of Education and other agencies.

Nearly a dozen of Trump's top appointees for his second term have been given an explicit mandate to shake up the federal workforce or expressed support for those plans, according to personnel announcements and media interviews reviewed by Reuters.

Russell Vought, nominated by Trump to return as director of the Office of Management and Budget, played a central role in crafting an earlier version of the reclassification order, known as Schedule F, as Trump was leaving office in 2020.

The revived executive order on Schedule F would allow agency officials to reclassify positions from career posts to political appointments, one of the sources familiar with transition planning said.

That would enable the agencies to fire career employees without cause and replace them.

Vought will be aided during Trump's second term by Sergio Gor, who was nominated to head the White House personnel office, and James Sherk, another Schedule F architect who Trump on Saturday named as a special assistant to the president.

In 2021, Sherk prepared a report for the America First Policy Institute, a conservative think tank, that detailed episodes in which he argues the federal bureaucracy intentionally frustrated Trump’s policy goals during his first term.

FIRING LINES

Others tasked with eradicating the "deep state" include Attorney General nominee Pam Bondi, the possible next FBI director, Kash Patel, Secretary of State nominee Marco Rubio, national security adviser Mike Waltz, education nominee Linda McMahon, and Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, who will head up Trump's government efficiency effort, the Reuters review found.

When asked, Trump's transition team would not provide details on a timeline for the planned shakeup, which could take months due to federal rule-making procedures.

"The Trump administration will have a place for people serving in government who are committed to defending the rights of the American people, putting America first, and ensuring the best use of working men and women's tax dollars," said spokesperson Brian Hughes.

Critics and the unions that represent federal workers say there is no such thing as a "deep state," and that Trump and his allies are trafficking in a conspiracy theory to justify an executive-branch power grab.

James Eisenmann, a lawyer and expert on federal workforce policy, said in an interview that Trump is mistaken that most government employees harbor an ideological agenda and noted that under current law, underperforming or insubordinate workers can be fired.

Schedule F, he said, would create a culture of silence and fear that could affect job performance.

"People are going to be afraid to speak up or even suggest something helpful out of fear of getting fired," Eisenmann said. "When people are afraid, it's not easy to get them to do stuff."

Steve Lenkart, executive director of the National Federation of Federal Workers, said in an interview that the new classification was aimed at creating "a secret police" within the federal government.

"The incoming administration admits they will use Schedule F to subject professional employees to professional or to political loyalty tests and will get rid of the undesirables," he said.

Hughes, the Trump transition spokesperson, did not respond to questions about what role individual nominees would play in carrying out Trump's agenda, or to the "secret police" allegation.

FINDING TARGETS

During Senate confirmation hearings on Wednesday, Vought and Bondi expressed support for the policies behind Schedule F.

Vought testified that he believes portions of the federal government have been "weaponized."

He declined to answer questions about whether he had advised Trump to conduct mass firings, but said reclassifying career employees would ensure the president has individuals in a policy-making role "who are responding to his views, his agenda."

Bondi, during her hearing, said Special Counsel Jack Smith's probe of Trump was evidence of partisanship within the Justice Department.

She vowed not to use the department to target people based on their politics, but dodged direct questions about investigating Trump's political adversaries.

The Biden Justice Department has long denied that it pursued criminal cases against Trump for political reasons. It did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.

The process of identifying members of the federal bureaucracy whose views could be at odds with the incoming administration has already begun.

In December, the American Accountability Foundation, which operates with support from the conservative Heritage Foundation, sent a letter to Pentagon nominee Pete Hegseth naming 20 leaders across the U.S. military whom it deemed to be overly focused on diversity and inclusion initiatives.

Outgoing Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has defended such efforts, saying the diverse military reflects the diversity of the United States.

The Pentagon referred a request for comment to the Trump transition team.

The American Accountability Foundation also published a "Top 10 Targets" list on its website of career employees at the Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department it claims are resistant to increased border-security efforts.

There are more names to come, said Yitz Friedman, a spokesperson for the group.

© Thomson Reuters 2025.

©2025 GPlusMedia Inc.

11 Comments

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This unpatriotic behavior has been predicted and Biden has moved many federal employees out of the reach of terrorists.

1 ( +8 / -7 )

Each individual loser in charge of a department will wonder how he is expected to not utterly fail and realize he has to keep people that actually know how to do things on.

2 ( +8 / -6 )

Their are 10 of thousands of lawyers,that will challenge Trump policies, successfully

2 ( +6 / -4 )

Trump and his acolytes do not understand it seems that members of the civil service are not there to support a particular party or individual politicians. They are there to serve the American people in accordance with the laws and budgets passed by Congress. If you serve for any length of time you work for multiple Presidents from either political party and with Congresses dominated by both at different times. Doesn't matter, doesn't change your job usually. You do your job and let politics take care of itself. But now one has to worry about losing their civil service status and being made a political appointee. So replace non-partisan competence and devotion to duty with partisan bootlickers with little or no experience. Turn a meritocracy into a patronage system. Somehow I don't see the courts allowing this to happen but it will take years to play out.

And a subsequent administration could simply undo it and put things back as they were before but the loss of knowledge will be impossible to replace.

3 ( +8 / -5 )

jack smith latest document drop shows the trump campaign paid for travel, hotel, expenses and organizing efforts for far-right, radical organizations to travel to washington on january 6th.

the assault on the capitol was planned, as if we didn’t know already.

that is who wants to “control” the government.

your children will be asking you what the hell were you thinking back then when you voted for him.

4 ( +9 / -5 )

The article talks about a domestic deep state which is of little interest to those of us outside the US.

What is interesting is how Trump 2.0 gets on against the foreign policy establishment, or "military industrial complex" or foreign policy "deep state". This establishment has ensured every president has followed a US "full spectrum dominance" neo-conservative foreign policy. This affects everyone in the world. The failures in Afghanistan and Ukraine strongly suggest the US should pull back, for its own sake as much as anyone elses.

-2 ( +3 / -5 )

The goal is to inject political loyalists deep into the workings of government, perhaps more so that any other recent president.

and

Schedule F, he said, would create a culture of silence and fear that could affect job performance.

"People are going to be afraid to speak up or even suggest something helpful out of fear of getting fired," Eisenmann said. "When people are afraid, it's not easy to get them to do stuff."

Sounds like the dismantling of one deep state is the beginning of a Deeper State that would bring a new meaning to the Hatching and Conditioning Centre.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

This unpatriotic behavior has been predicted and Biden has moved many federal employees out of the reach of terrorists.

Hardly, there are many more thousands of federal employees that will either get the ax or that will be relocated, the thing is, they will not be working anywhere near this new administration, so there will be a definite purge, and there is nothing wrong with that, I often faulted Trump for not doing that in his first term, but this time around he’s going to do that, Obama did the same thing when he became president he purged all of Bushes, federal workers, so I think it’s a good thing, and frankly a needed thing for security and for the good of his administration.

Each individual loser in charge of a department will wonder how he is expected to not utterly fail and realize he has to keep people that actually know how to do things on.

All done, he’s got some of the best and smartest people and the simple fact that he has American loyalists just warms my heart to the core.

-4 ( +1 / -5 )

bass4funkToday 04:14 pm JST

This unpatriotic behavior has been predicted and Biden has moved many federal employees out of the reach of terrorists.

Hardly, there are many more thousands of federal employees that will either get the ax or that will be relocated, the thing is, they will not be working anywhere near this new administration, so there will be a definite purge, and there is nothing wrong with that, I often faulted Trump for not doing that in his first term, but this time around he’s going to do that, Obama did the same thing when he became president he purged all of Bushes, federal workers, so I think it’s a good thing, and frankly a needed thing for security and for the good of his administration.

What's the over under on even 1 in 10 federal employees being fired?

Each individual loser in charge of a department will wonder how he is expected to not utterly fail and realize he has to keep people that actually know how to do things on.

All done, he’s got some of the best and smartest people and the simple fact that he has American loyalists just warms my heart to the core.

You confuse Putin loyalists with American loyalists.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

What's the over under on even 1 in 10 federal employees being fired?

One too many

You confuse Putin loyalists with American loyalists.

No, I was responsible for putting American loyalists back into the WH, starting in just a few hours.

-5 ( +1 / -6 )

" In November 2024, the federal government employed just over 3 million people, or 1.87% of the entire civilian workforce, according to BLS data. That figure doesn't count the roughly 1.3 million active-duty military personnel, who aren't typically considered “employees.”

How many will be heading to the Musk Dole queue?

3 ( +4 / -1 )

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